Mobile Website vs. Mobile Applications – Pitfalls of Mobile SEO
Mobile is booming and many practices are scrambling to develop a medical or dental mobile marketing strategy to capitalize on this new market. There are two options for developing a mobile strategy:
1) Building a mobile application
2) Building a mobile website
The two options, however, are distinctly different especially when it pertains to your search engine optimization strategy.
Importance of SEO for Mobile Marketing
Search engine optimization has been an essential component of your marketing strategy since the development of your first website. The sheer power of SEO is obvious by measuring the amount of quality traffic and targeted leads that are delivered to your practice. SEO plays an equally weighted role in your mobile campaign.
A mobile website is basically your website reformatted to fit on a mobile device. The content, images, forms etc. are simply modified to display on a smaller screen. The domain address is identical and you do not have to download anything to access the mobile version.
In turn, the mobile site carries as much importance on the search engines as your main website. If you rank #3 on Google for “San Diego Rhinoplasty,” your mobile site will also be seen as #3 via Google on your mobile phone. All of the hard work and effort in ranking well on the search engines can now be passed to your mobile strategy through a mobile website.
Pitfalls of a Mobile Application
A mobile application does not boast the same SEO power as the mobile website. A mobile application is developed separately from your main website. It appears to the search engines as its own entity. Therefore, the power of your traditional website’s SEO strategy cannot be passed to the mobile application.
Additionally, just like your traditional website, a mobile application’s search engine ranking success depends on the quality of your content. Oftentimes application developers will take pages of content and additional material from your website and apply them to your mobile application. The biggest problem with this strategy is that the content will appear to the search engines as duplicate content. Duplicate content not only keeps your mobile application from indexing, but it could potentially hurt your entire SEO strategy.
The mobile market is here, but before you pull the trigger on a mobile website or a mobile application, it is important to do your homework and outline your goals. If mobile SEO is a factor in your strategy, consider the mobile website.